Sansa Clip - Reviews?

[Shiny_H320]

Hey, Coreman thanks for the reply. Could you elaborate on rockbox on your sansa e2xx. I was actually thinking about getting a e260, but this file sorting thing has got me really peeved. Can you organize by folders and filenames, plus what other advantages does rockbox have and how hard/easy was it to install. Any problems? because I had installed rockbox on my H320 and it killed my battery. Sorry for all the questions, but I'm excited at the prospect of a player with features I want. Thanks

n As for the wall charger, no I have not verified the wall charger thing I just assumed you could because if you get the proper adapter w/ voltage according to your player it should theoretically work. I am no expert though

Oh and melodyh40 I think the worst thing that can happen if you fry your player is just that you might get a dirty look from the customer service person when you return it. lol

[melodyh40]

Originally Posted by Shiny_H320

Oh and melodyh40 I think the worst thing that can happen if you fry your player is just that you might get a dirty look from the customer service person when you return it. lol

Minnesota is WAY too far from Alberta to take it back! I should probably wait until it makes it's way north of the border, but I want to get it before I go deaf of old age and can't hear it anyways!

Thanks for your reply!

Melody

[Step666]

Originally Posted by melodyh40

I am, now, thoroughly confused about the whole wall USB charging thing. I actually have one of these, which I got with some accessories for my H320. I've never used it, as I DO NOT want to fry my beloved and I still have the stock AC charger anyways. If I try to use it with the Clip, what's the worst that can happen? Will it just not charge, or can it brick my player? I know that you've already addressed this, Step, but I feel the need to ask again. Is there something on the player that I can check? Thanks!

The worst that could happen is that you fry your player.
Poof, dead...

As for whether there is something on the player, or in the box, that says what sort of current and voltage it can safely take, I don't know - maybe Shiny could help us out here.
Then you compare that to what the sticker on the USB charger says (all chargers are, I believe, required to indicate their output).

[Shiny_H320]

All I could find was this on the outside of the box: USB 2.0 high-power port required for Hi-speed transfer and charging.

But inside the instruction manual it says "The battery can also be charged using an AC adapter (not included) or a car adapter(not included) and you will be able to play your device while charging with one of the adapters.

NOTE: Some low-power USB ports may not be able to provide enough charge power."

Good luck!

[Shiny_H320]

BTW I found out that if you want to view your Sansa clip as a Drive UMS/MSC instead of MTP device on your computer do this:
-Put the player in Hold mode.
-Then hold the middle Select button while plugging in the USB cord. It should appear as a new drive.

I still haven't figured out how to organize my music by file names in folders. So if anyone does please let me know. Thanks

[Step666]

What order does it display the tracks in?

Is it, perhaps, the order they were transferred over?
If so, then maybe xcopy might help.

[Shiny_H320]

The tracks are in alphabetical order, but its weird you still can't browse by folder. You still have to do the whole album, artist, playlist... etc. I just use a tag editor and rename all my music with the same album name.

I took a look at xcopy, but I'm not sure its what I need. Thanks anyway

[melodyh40]

OK - I'm baaaaaack!

I've been using my Sansa Clip (apparently very plentiful in Minnesota!) for a bit and have some thoughts. First of all, KILLER player! Excellent sound, even when playing through my AUX in my truck. Very small and light, which I gotta tell ya is weird after using my H320 for so long! User interface is very untuitive, although there are two buttons that do essentially the same thing which I think is a waste. But, hey, they both do work, so I shouldn't grouse about that!

Like Shiny, I too wish I could browse by folder. It just has the standard "All Songs" - "Artist" - "Album" - "Genre" etc. This would be OK with me, since my files are all tagged properly, BUT I wish that there were some way to bypass the Album after you've chosen "Artist". That is, I wish you could just click on "Radiohead" and see all songs on your player by Radiohead. Instead, you have to choose a particular album first. This would be OK, but I sometimes cannot remember which song is on which album and it takes me forever to find it this way. I know, I know, why not just go through "All Songs" to find the song? It takes a long time to scroll. Shiny (or anyone else), is there some way to scroll by screen (the H320 works by pressing and holding the Play button when hitting the down arrow)? This would make it faster.

Also, you guys remember the bug that made the "Shuffle" on the H320 repeat whole sets of songs in the same order? This player appears to have the same bug! Annoying.

I've yet to charge it, and used it lots and played with it lots, so that the screen was lit up quite a bit. I'm pretty impressed with the battery life. I dislike that you have to press a button to "activate" the player and then press the button you want (i.e., it takes two presses to up the volume one knotch), but oh well. I've just gotten used to Norbu's build in Rockbox which allows you to press buttons without first activating the screen. That's one of the best things about Rockbox (and, the OTF playlist) - yeah, I know I'm spoiled! Speaking of that, there's a option to select what pressing and holding the middle button is supposed to do, and I have it set to "Add song to current playlist". I can't seem to get it to work, though. Any luck, Shiny?

OK - I've blathered on enough. The long and the short of it is, GREAT player, good sound, nice, but a couple of things could be improved. Anyone wanna Rockbox it? (just kidding!).

Have a terrific evening!

Mel

[Shiny_H320]

So you finally got it. Cool! Anyhow, I'm not sure exactly what you are speaking of, but once I go into "artist" I can view all that artist's songs.
As for the go-list (on the fly play-list) you can only add songs to the list while you are listening to that particular song (sucks, but its better than nothing)
Oh have you tried the cool little visualization. While playing a song just press the center button and you get little equalizer bars

BTW I like your taste in music. Radiohead is awesome. Have you heard their latest album "In Rainbows?" Some fave tracks are "All I Need," "15 step," but the whole album is beautiful.

-Shiny

[ShyAnne]

Originally Posted by Shiny_H320

Anyhow, I'm not sure exactly what you are speaking of, but once I go into "artist" I can view all that artist's songs.

Shiny, probably that's possible because of something you said in your last post, specifically:

I just use a tag editor and rename all my music with the same album name.

If Melody's tags have the correct album names instead of all the same then songs on her Sansa are gonna show up by artist and then individual album, instead of all songs by artist. 'Course if she uses your renaming trick then it's certainly possible to show songs by artist only.

The Clip sounds like a neat little player! I saw one the day before yesterday and it's really tiny! Certainly should give the new iPod Shuffle a run for its money since unlike the Shuffle the Clip has a screen, equalizer, FM, and even recording. Not to mention Clip also has longer battery life, is far less expensive than the Shuffle and reportedly sounds much better. With the Clip out there I'm not sure why anyone would bother with the Shuffle at all.

[Mike]

Because, as a buyer no doubt will say, the Shuffle looks cool ...

[melodyh40]

Hi!

No, I haven't yet heard Radiohead's new one, but there's a thread on here somewhere that discusses the album in detail. Perhaps I've found my own Christmas present?

ShyAnne is right regarding the whole artist/album trick. I don't wish to "unname" all of my albums, since I do occassionally like to listen to one whole album (tonight on my way back home I decided to listen to Jim Brickman's "In Pictures"). I guess I'll just have to deal.

That explains why I couldn't get the "Add to Playlist" thing to work. Thanks, Shiny! The way I see it, it's pretty much a useless function. If you're listening to it, isn't it already IN the current OTF playlist?

I was kinda joking about Rockbox, but I see that a couple of the Sansa players are currently supported. I'm tempted to put in a "Feature Request" at the Rockbox site to see if they would make Rockbox firmware for it. Do you think I'd get crucified if I tried this? I checked - no one else has asked. I wonder how different it would have to be from the other two Sansa player's Rockbox. What do you all think?

I don't get why people bother with Ipods, either. This player sounds great, looks great, works great (aside from my little gripees, but that's just a personal thing!). I don't really understand the whole equalizer thing. I don't care much about it. I spend very little time actually staring at my player. I'd sooner that middle button do something cool. It's pretty wasted right now. Shiny, have you found a setting in there somewhere to make it so that you don't have to turn the display on (activate the light) to get it to do anything? THAT would be a great use for the middle button. Press it to turn on the light, only, and I guess again to change to the equalizer, if you like. The other buttons should work on the FIRST press without turning on the lights.

In any case, I like the player lots. The people who've seen it all want me to get them one sent up from the States!

Have a wonderful evening, all!

Melody

EDIT: Happened across the following review: http://www.anythingbutipod.com/archi...lip-review.php . The guy addresses some of the questions both Shiny and I have and someone commented about the "Shufflebug" at the bottom.

ANOTHER EDIT: (am I driving you all crazy yet?) There is new firmware for the clip: http://forums.sandisk.com/sansa/boar...cending&page=1 . Read the whole thread before attempting anything. I"m not doing mine tonight (very sleepy!) but will try soon. Hopefully, they've addressed the "Shufflebug"! Good night!

[Shiny_H320]

I think you girls are misunderstanding me about the renaming folder trick. I still have plenty of different albums on my player, but for random/misc music I rename the album tag with an editor so they are easy to find. I can still search for an artist and find anyone of their songs regardless of whether I renamed the album or not. BTW melody you don't have to "unname" your albums. I was just using that as an example. You can rename a useless folder tag like "genres". Also I don't ever touch my PC original music with the tag editor. I just make copies that I can mess around with and won't care if I make a mistake with the editor.

As for the play-list. It's a process to have listen to the music in order to add it to the go-list, but nevertheless its useful.

I don't spend loads of time staring at my player either, but it's a nice sign when a company is willing to add a little something extra like that instead of just stamping out another generic player. It makes it stand out in a good way.

And no I have not found a way to make it work on the first press, but since I don't really see how useful that can be. I have not looked. Its just another click anyway.

Good luck!

[melodyh40]

Shiny - Yeah, I know, I'm laaaazy as sin!

Do you use Rockbox for anything? I wonder if Rockbox for the supported Sansa players would work with the Clip (?). Anyone have any thoughts on the matter?

[Step666]

RockBox needs to be tailored to each individual player.

I mean, you wouldn't flash Sandisk's firmware for the e200s to the Clip, so you wouldn't use RockBox for them on it either.

[melodyh40]

Thanks, Step. It's not like I was going to try it, or anything. According to the Sandisk site, the interface is IDENTICAL to the interface of another player in the Sansa line. I was just holding out some hope that it might work!

[Step666]

No, I didn't think you were going to try it.

As for the interface, that doesn't really make much difference - it's just the cover of the book, as it were.
The hardware may well be very different and that's what will be important when it comes to RockBoxing it.

[melodyh40]

Ahhhh, I see. My hopes are dashed...

(slumps crying from the room...) : )

[Step666]

I'm sure that if you were to ask nicely, the RockBox team would take a look at it for you.
I mean, it can't be that difficult a DAP to port to compared to larger players with more hardware to have to deal with.

[coreman]

Rockbox on my E200 is really sweet ! I had the same problems with the strange manner of sorting songs until I Rockbox'd my player. But battery life seems about 30% shorter than without Rockbox...small price to pay though!!

Besides neat features like "sleep timer", "equalizer" and ability to sort in just about any fashion, it also has customizable While Playing Screen (commonly referred to as WPS in most posts)... and Step's correct, it's the hardware that determines Rockbox compatibility...not sure how Rockbox works but seems the first step is to get a player and tear it down to get a hardware list. With the Clip being so new, it may be a while.

PS: I would like to add one other comment here...because of the excellent sound reproduction of the Sansa E200 and Transflash slot, I do not plan on buying any more HDD based players...I am finding that I can load up songs or playlists on 2 Gb SD cards (about $20) and carry them with me...then I can change out as often as I want while I wait for a reasonably priced 16Gb Sansa flash player.

Sansa is my new favorite player...my wife's Clix (original) still sounds great and all but the Sansa has the advantage (in my book) with that little SD slot...

[melodyh40]

Thanks for your replies! I finally updated the firmware (2 hours later...). It's too long of a story to tell, but suffice to say that the "Sansa Dispatcher" is the most stupid piece of software EVER!

I LOVE Rockbox on my H320, for much the same reasons as Coreman stated. I'll begin drafting a request to the Rockbox God/desses about the Clip. But, yeah, I realize it would take some time to get into the guts of the player, even if someone cares to do it. At least it's cheap enough.

Oh, and Shiny, I don't know if you've updated your firmware yet, but it totally fixed the Shufflebug!

Later!

Mel

[ShyAnne]

Originally Posted by Shiny_H320

BTW I found out that if you want to view your Sansa clip as a Drive UMS/MSC instead of MTP device on your computer do this:
-Put the player in Hold mode.
-Then hold the middle Select button while plugging in the USB cord. It should appear as a new drive.

Read somewhere (can't remember where) the sequence to switch to full UMS drag/drop is shut the player off, put it in "hold", then press and hold "rewind" while connecting to the USB. So is the middle button "rewind"? If so that seems an odd placement for rewind

Either way it's not a one-time thing, it has to be done each time the Clip's connected. Also apparently doesn't make the player itself stay in UMS after disconnecting so still no file browsing, only by ID3 tag.

Originally Posted by Mike